When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!: Inspiration and Wisdom From One of Baseball's Greatest Heroes [Hardcover]

Yogi Berra (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 23, 2001

An exciting new collection of sublimely simple wisdom from a bestselling author, celebrated athlete, and a true American hero.

Three-time MVP and Hall of Famer Yogi Berra hit home runs twice in a row with his two previous books, The Yogi Book and It Ain't Over. Now, his winning streak will continue with this latest work -- a collection of appealing, funny, and surprisingly moving essays on life, happiness, and getting through the slumps.

Filled with another delightful helping of Yogi's inimitable and unwittingly wise aphorisms, these reflections focus on the valuable lessons he's learned on and off the field. From his early years as an immigrant's son who dropped out of the eighth grade through his triumphant career as a player and manager who played in a record seventy five World Series games, Yogi illustrates his homespun philosophies with apt analogies to his trove of baseball stories. He expounds on such topics as Patience (Waiting for your pitch); Sacrifice (Laying down a bunt); Trusting Others (Taking direction); and Staying Focused (Keeping your eye on the ball), to show how the rules of life and baseball are uncannily similar. And, in the tradition of Don't Sweat the Small Stuff and All I Really Need to I Know I Learned in Kindergarten, he explains his recipe for fulfillment and happiness with life lessons that are profoundly simple, simply profound -- and classic Yogi to the core. Following on the heels of two New York Times bestselling books and filled with memorable photos, this new collection of Yogi wisdom will undoubtedly expand his growing legion of fans. When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It! is a wise, humble, touching book that's a guaranteed winner. In short, it's déjà vu all over again.

A baseball legend reflects on the following lessons...

"A nickel ain't worth a dime any more."

"It ain't over til it's over."

"You can't think and hit at the same time."

"I didn't really say everything I said."

"The future ain't what it used to be."

... and many more

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Hall of Fame philosopher Yogi Berra's When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It! is another volume of musings and malaprops, and the advice implicit in the title is sound indeed. Just listen: "Throughout life you come to serious forks in the road--decisions," Yogi tells us. "Which path do you choose? Sometimes it's tough. People are always afraid of making the wrong choice." Not Yogi, who explains that tragedy lies in paralysis, not bad choices or regrets, and offers personal examples from on and off the field to prop up his profundity.

Like its predecessor, The Yogi Book, Fork is essentially a collection of Yogi's well-traveled observations from out of left field, but it's much more than just déjà vu all over again. Instead of explaining, as he has before, what prompted a particular Yogi-ism or what he was really trying to say, Yogi does his best to go deep. The charm is that Yogi's so guileless, he makes it work--there's sagacity in his simplicity. Each Yogi-ism gets its own short chapter in which Yogi riffs off the phrase to dispense a bit of homespun wisdom and inspiration. "It gets late early out there"--we get old before we're ready, but here's how to cope with it. "If you can't imitate him, don't copy him"--we all need to be true to ourselves. With Yogi's latest career as a successful author, not only ain't it over for him, there's happily no end in sight. --Jeff Silverman

From Publishers Weekly

Upping the ante of such bestselling titles as It Ain't Over and The Yogi Book, When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It: Inspiration and Wisdom from One of Baseball's Greatest Heroes collects more anecdotes and bon mots from the Yankees' Hall of Fame sage, Yogi Berra. A collaboration by Berra and Dave Kaplan, who is executive director of the nonprofit Yogi Berra Museum and Learning Center, a sports education facility at Montclair State University (close to Berra's home in Montclair, N.J.), the book pairs 40 classic Berra aphorisms "It's déjà vu all over again" and "Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded" among them with Berra's glosses and expansive colloquial commentary to help readers in their own decision making. Along the way, we learn the secrets to his 50-year marriage with "Carm" (they "talk over everything") and to his three-time MVP career as a player and pennant-winning seasons as a manager.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: Hyperion (May 23, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786867752
• ISBN-13: 978-0786867752
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.2 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (24 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #399,835 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars When Taking the Bull by the Horns, You'll See the Point!, June 14, 2001

By 

Donald Mitchell "Jesus Loves You!" (Thanks for Providing My Reviews over 109,000 Helpful Votes Globally) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 100 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!: Inspiration and Wisdom From One of Baseball's Greatest Heroes (Hardcover)

Yogi Berra is our modern day version of Will Rogers. He talks about life and what he sees, and captures a fundamental truth and humor that tickle our fancy and our sense of what's right.

This book contains many of Yogi's most famous aphorisms, followed by essays that explain what he means . . . in other words.

Here are some of my favorites among his aphorisms in this book (which double as titles for the essays):

"We Have a Good Time Together, Even When We're Not Together."

"If People Don't Want to Come Out to the Park, Nobody's Going to Stop Them."

"Ninety Percent of the Game Is Half Mental."

"You Observe a Lot by Watching."

"It's Deja Vu All Over Again."

"We Made Too Many Wrong Mistakes."

"It Gets Late Early Out Here."

"Nobody Goes There Any More, It's Too Crowded."

"I Love Movies When I Like Them."

"If the World Were Perfect, It Wouldn't Be."

"Always Go to Other People's Funerals, Otherwise They Won't Go to Yours."

"Ninety Percent of Short Putts Don't Go In."

The beauty of Yogi's aphorisms is that we know exactly what he means, which we don't always appreciate about what more learned types have to say. The unusual content also jolts us into paying attention, instead of putting us into a mild doze.

About the aphorisms themselves, Yogi says this, "I don't think I ever said anything intentionally humorous in my life."

You could sum up his philosophy as "I really have no regrets." Yogi basically suggests that you take life as it comes, make the best of what it offers, and move on. His most beautiful aphorism is here also, "There Is Always Some Kid Who May Be Seeing Me for the First or Last Time. I Owe Him My Best." The essay describes how Joe DiMaggio always played the hero's role in public, and how much Yogi admired him for it.

The book also contains the famous story of how Yogi refused to reenter Yankee Stadium for 14 years after being summarily fired as manager in mid-season in 1985 (after being told this would not happen). George Steinbrenner finally met with Yogi and apologized. Yogi began coming to Yankee Stadium again. That struck me as very consistent with his sense of what's right and wrong.

Yogi chose to leave school at a very young age. He thought he didn't have much of a future there, and he felt he liked and could do a lot of other things better. That's the story behind the book's title. But Yogi reminds us, "People shouldn't forget where they came from." In fact, the essays double as an autobiography of Yogi.

I enjoyed his stories about the glory days of the five straight World Championships, and how he improved as a catcher while being lambasted by the sportswriters. Having listened to Don Larsen's perfect game against the Dodgers, it was fun to read what Yogi had to say about catching the game. I didn't know he called Larsen "Gooney Bird."

His essay about talking to players, pitchers and umps is also a classic.

Anyone would benefit from his advice about losing. "If [you]lose . . . , shake their hand and try harder next time."

He also maintains that it's not true he was ever in a hitting slump. He just wasn't getting many hits. That's an extension of his focus on keeping a positive outlook.

Each essay is preceded by a small black-and-white photograph. These add a nice personal touch to the essays.

After you read this book, think about where you need to take a fork in the road with courage and enthusiasm. Think of Yogi when you take that fork. He'll be pulling for you.

If the stick in your eye is hurting you, there's no law that says you have to keep holding it in there!

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Wit and Wisdom from the one and only Yogi Berra, May 24, 2001

By 

Lawrance M. Bernabo (The Zenith City, Duluth, Minnesota) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!: Inspiration and Wisdom From One of Baseball's Greatest Heroes (Hardcover)

Whether you call them Yogisms or Berraisms, the witty wisdom of Lawrence Peter "Yogi" Berra is part of our national heritage. "When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!" (a reference to part of Yogi's instructions on how to get to his home in Montclair, New Jersey) collects 40 of his famous sayings with commentary from the Hall of Fame catcher on their meaning, which is related to not only baseball but family life as well. Growing up on Dago Hill in St. Louis, Yogi was always more interested in baseball than in education, so while the man is certainly unschooled he is no dummy. His sayings, such as "Ninety percent of baseball is mental and the other half is physical," are amusing not because they are stupid but because they make perfect sense in a new and delightful way. I mean, come on: there are two parts to baseball, mental and physical, so if you talk about 1 out of 2 that's half, so what's your problem? The joy here is not just revisiting his famous sayings ("It ain't over, 'till its over," etc.), the ones he actually says he said anyway, but Yogi talking about what they mean to him. In the age of computers the folksy wisdom of Yogi is refreshing and brings us back to the basics. It is certainly great to know that when it comes to the literary career of Mr. Berra, it ain't anywhere near being over yet.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars It Ain't Over 'Til The Fat Lady Takes The Spoon In The Road, May 23, 2001

By 

Chad Spivak (North Miami Beach, Florida) - See all my reviews

This review is from: When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!: Inspiration and Wisdom From One of Baseball's Greatest Heroes (Hardcover)

Yes, the loveable crazy anecdote king is back, and he holds nothing back in this book. Yogi Berra guarantees that you will like this book that is 60% intellectual and 50% inspirational.

Confused by my weird sayings yet? You would truly have to appreciate Yogi to get the significant meaning behind them. In this wonderful book, you get to know him just a little bit better.

Berra has such an intuitive mind for the game of baseball, and he has certainly played for or coached his fair share of championship teams. He let's us in to the secrets of the sport, not to mention his amazing pearls of wisdom. With each gem of a story, there is a certain hidden life lesson to be learned. He hides nothing and tells it like it is in a true, matter-of-fact type literary voice.

There are also some truly wonderful pictures in the book. Overall, it flows very smoothly, and thanks to his bits of humor added here and there, the book winds up being a really quick, yet enjoyable read. This book has a lot to offer everyone, not just fans of the game.